Prince William ’s Earthshot Prize is heading to South Africa this year. The fourth annual awards ceremony will be held in Cape Town in November. The location for the 2024 Earthshot Prize Awards was announced on Feb. 9 with a video featuring global correspondent Sophia Li .
The Earthshot Prize noted that “with nearly 400 nominees for this year’s Prize based in Africa, it is clear the continent has the trailblazing creativity and innovation needed to make a significant impact.”
The upcoming awards ceremony will feature “extraordinary storytelling and star-studded performances,” and will celebrate the work of this year’s 15 finalists, five of whom will be awarded £1 million.
The 2024 Earthshot Prize Awards will kick off Earthshot Week, which will “spotlight groundbreaking environmental solutions and bring together world-leading innovators, investors and philanthropists to drive forward the restoration and protection of our planet.”
Prince William launched the Earthshot Prize in 2020 “to search for and scale the most innovative solutions to the world’s greatest environmental challenges.” The inaugural Earthshot Prize Awards ceremony took place in London back in 2021. The second was held in Boston and the third in Singapore. The Princess of Wales accompanied her husband to the first two ceremonies, but missed the third one last November because she was helping her son Prince George “through his first set of major exams.”
In a speech at the 2023 ceremony, the heir to the throne said, “Hope does remain. The light of optimism is burning bright in our Earthshot finalists.” Prince William noted that the winners and finalists “remind us that no matter where you are on our planet, the spirit of ingenuity and the ability to inspire change surrounds us all.”